Without Fail
by Eve Davidson
Summary: Something bad happens to Sheldon, and Leonard tries to pick up the pieces.
1. Chapter 1

Leonard could feel the goggles slipping down his nose. It was hot in the lab when the laser had been running all day. He took a deep breath, pushed the goggles up one final time, and ran the last experiment.

He glanced at the clock but he knew from the way the light was casting shadows that it was nearly time to go. Time to pack up the lab, power down all the equipment, file the notes from today. Time to walk over to Sheldon's office and wait for him to tie up the loose ends of his day, time to walk to his car and drive home in the fading California sun. Time to stop off at the Indian place they both liked and pick up the take-out, time to go home and relax.

He shrugged into his jean jacket, adjusted the hood from his sweatshirt so it laid flat against the jacket, and slung his bag over his shoulder. It was a little later than usual, his last experiment had run long. Sheldon should be fine, he tended to just work right up until he showed up, which could be late and frequently was. He knew that Sheldon had worked his tendency to be late into his schedule.

He walked across campus to the building where Sheldon's office was, enjoying the mild California weather all these years after leaving his native New Jersey, but it wasn't easy to forget those bone chilling winters, the way your fingertips would get red and cold, the way you could almost never warm up.

The hallway to Sheldon's office was lit with subdued ceiling lights, and he tread across the gray carpet. No one was here, not on this floor. It was quiet. When he got to the door he knocked and waited for Sheldon to yell to him to come in. There was no answer, and he knocked again, slightly louder. No answer. Leonard's brow furrowed, and he began to tick over the possibilities in his head. Had Sheldon left with Howard or Raj without telling him? That didn't seem likely. What was more likely was that he was in a meeting somewhere else and hadn't let him know. He took his phone out and checked for messages but there weren't any. The more he thought of this the less likely it seemed. Sheldon was frequently called to meetings that ran late, but he always let him know. Always. Without fail.

Where was he?

He knocked again, his fist pounding on the door.

"Sheldon!" No answer. He opened the door and went in. The room was dark. When his eyes adjusted he saw someone huddled in the corner of the office. It was Sheldon, his knees drawn up to his chest, his arms wrapped around them, his head down. Leonard blinked. Looking around, he noticed the disarray of the room. Papers knocked to the floor, the desk chair overturned, the legs pointing toward the ceiling. He advanced cautiously.

"Sheldon?" he said, his name almost a whisper. No response. He reached out to touch his arm and when he did Sheldon jerked away and looked up at him, pulling closer to the corner, pulling closer into himself. In the dim light he saw the blood that had dried on Sheldon's bruised lips. Sheldon was looking at him, his blue eyes wide and frightened, but he didn't seem to be recognizing him at all.

"Sheldon, hey, it's me, Leonard," he said, lowering himself so he was almost at eye level with him. It was then that he noticed the tears in his shirt, the quickness and shallowness of his breathing.

"Leonard?" Sheldon said, questioning the reality of Leonard kneeling in front of him.

"Yeah, buddy, it's me,"

He put his head down again, and Leonard noticed how messy his hair was, how it fell across his forehead in shaggy bangs instead of being neatly brushed to the side.

"What happened?" Leonard said, talking to the top of his head. He wouldn't look up, he wouldn't uncurl himself from the little ball he was in, he wouldn't get out of the corner of his darkened office. He wouldn't answer him. Leonard licked his lips, surmising the possibilities of what had happened. Someone, or someones, had beaten him up, robbed him, maybe...in here. Obviously in here, based on the state of the room.

"Are you okay? Are you, were you mugged?" Leonard said, and got no response. The expensive laptop computer was still on the desk, although upside down and near the edge, ready to totter over any second. The expensive collectibles were still here, the book shelves that displayed them were undisturbed. Did he still have his cell phone and wallet?

Unsure of what to do, he stood up and flipped the light on. He righted the chair and moved the laptop to a more secure position on the desk. He gathered up the white snowdrift of papers and stacked them neatly and set them on the desk. Then there was nothing left to do but try and deal with Sheldon.

He still had his knees drawn up to his chest, he still hugged them tightly, and now he could see the marks and bruising on his hands and forearms. He still had his head down, his face covered.

"Sheldon," he said, trying for firm but failing, his name wavering. Leonard could feel himself start to shake. What had happened and why? He couldn't shake, he couldn't fall apart. He had to deal with this, and he was probably the only one who could. He took a deep breath, resolving to fall apart later if he needed to fall apart.

"Sheldon," he said again, and kneeled down next to him, put his hand on his arm, and he felt the immediate tensing of his muscles at the contact. Sheldon wasn't generally good with physical contact but it wasn't like this.

"C'mon, we need to go, we need to..." Still he wasn't moving, he wasn't responding. Was he going to have to drag him from the office? He couldn't leave him here. He wished wildly for Penny. Penny would know how to coax him up and out of here, Penny could get him to talk and tell them what happened.

But Penny wasn't here. He wouldn't call her. He could deal with this.

He put his thumb under Sheldon's chin and lifted his face up, and he saw the beginnings of the deep purple bruising around both eyes, the line of blood from his mouth like a cartoon vampire, and Sheldon squeezed his eyes shut. He was so totally cut off, so deep inside himself, his distant autistic tendencies serving him well right now.

"Sheldon, you need to get up now. We're going to go home. Stand up or I'll drag you out of here," Leonard said, standing, pulling on Sheldon's arm. Still, he wouldn't move, he shrugged from his grasp. Damn it.

Leonard leaned against the wall, closed his eyes and slid down it to sit on the rug beside Sheldon. What should he do? He didn't want to force him to move but they couldn't stay here all night. They should be going to the hospital, because who knew how injured he was? There were bruises everywhere he could see.

"Sheldon, listen to me. You're alright now, whatever happened, whoever did this...they're gone. It's me, Leonard. I'm gonna bring you home, okay? Okay?"

Maybe it was his words or his soft tone, but Sheldon opened his eyes and seemed to comprehend now that it was just him, just his roommate and colleague and friend. He watched him swallow hard and take a deep breath and he answered him in a broken scratched voice.

"Okay,"


	2. Chapter 2

Leonard watched Sheldon get slowly to his feet, looking up slightly, realizing again how much taller he was. He stood and wrapped his arms around his stomach, and even just standing there Leonard could see that he was in pain. He squinted at him, wanting to know what happened, and how it could have happened here.

"Okay, good," he said, looking around for Sheldon's bag, not seeing it. Then he saw it leaning against the wall and he grabbed it. Sheldon just stood where he was, not looking like he was going to move. Leonard started toward him and he flinched back, the flinch a violent jerk of his entire body.

"Sheldon," Leonard said in the same soft and soothing voice that had got him to stand up in the first place, "it's okay, c'mon, we'll go home, okay?"

Sheldon nodded, looking at him quickly and then glancing away. Leonard headed toward the door of the office, hoping that Sheldon would follow. He did, his walk stiff, one eye already swelling up and watering. He didn't want to move toward him or touch him, so he kept walking at a steady pace toward the car, listening to the sound of Sheldon's footsteps behind him.

What sometimes happened when he and Sheldon were late coming home was that Penny would let Raj and Howard into their apartment with her spare key. He hoped that that wasn't the case now, because he didn't want to walk into a roomful of people with Sheldon bloody and beaten and no answers.

Everything seemed hyperreal on the way home, the fading sunlight reflecting off of glass storefronts, the particular blue of the sky reflected in the glass, the cracks in the faded tar of the roads, the shingles on the houses and the dirt that clung to them, a certain filth made up of car exhaust and smog. Sheldon was buckled in the front passenger seat, sitting as close to the door as he could. He was staring out the window, and when Leonard glanced at him he could see the deep cut in his bottom lip that was bleeding still, he could see the bruising around his eyes and that it probably came from getting hit on the bridge of his nose, which had a gash and was swelling, too. What injuries were under his clothes? He thought that he should just drive straight to the hospital. Sheldon hated hospitals.

"I'm...I think maybe we should go to the hospital-"

"No," Sheldon said, turning his head to look at him, his eyes wide and panicked again.

"But you're hurt, you might need-"

"No, Leonard, I can't...no,"

"Why?" Leonard said, thinking he could argue with him about the germs in hospitals if that was the issue.

"I don't want anyone else touching me," Sheldon said, his voice lowered to a husky whisper, and Leonard watched him turn away to stare out the window again, leaning his forehead against the glass.

Up all the stairs, Sheldon gripped the railing tightly as they made their way up to the fourth floor. If he'd ever wished for the elevator to be working, it was now. Leonard carried both bags and walked slightly behind him, hearing the sharp intake of his breath.

He knew they should be at a hospital right now.

He heard the voices inside their apartment before he got to the door and he sighed. They'd all be there. He heard laughter, he heard Penny's high pitched voice and Howard's deeper response. He didn't hear Raj, he must not have dipped into the beers yet.

He opened the door and stepped inside, wondering if they would be able to tell by his expression that something was wrong. They all looked up at him, and he saw the smiles fade from their faces even before Sheldon came in behind him. When Sheldon followed him inside he watched all three of his friends' eyes widen and their mouths form little O's of surprise.

"Oh my God," Howard said.

"Sheldon! What happened?" Penny said.

Sheldon didn't respond, he just stared at them for a moment before going to his room and shutting the door. Leonard stood there, staring at the white boxes of Chinese take-out littering the coffee table.

Penny stood up and came over to him, grabbed the labels of his jean jacket, her hands twisting in the denim fabric just for something to do.

"What happened to him?" she said, staring through the lenses of his glasses.

"I...I don't know...when I came to get him at his office..." It trailed off, and he saw him huddled in the corner of that office.

"Yeah? What?" Penny said, trying to stare through the lenses of his glasses and into his eyes.

"He...it was dark, and everything was all...everything was wrecked in there...and he was like that...all beaten up and huddled in the corner..."

Penny shook her head, her blond hair moving with the motion. Leonard noticed her smooth tanned skin, her aqua green eyes that reminded him of the ocean back home and a line from one of Sylvia Plath's poems, "bean green over blue,"

"You should have brought him to the hospital," she said, and he nodded.

"Why didn't you? You don't know how hurt he is or what even happened! Leonard, we need to bring him to the hospital now, and call the police-"

"Penny, I could barely get him out of that corner in his office, I barely got him home, and he didn't want to go to the hospital-"

"So what! Do you think he knows what is best for him right now! It doesn't matter what he wants, he needs to go!" Penny was so adamant, and he noticed the determined set to her jaw, the way she crossed her arms and stood with one foot at an angle, her body posture telling him she knew what was best and don't argue.

It wasn't so easy with Sheldon, it was almost impossible to get him to do what he didn't want to do, and he just felt that going to the hospital would be almost traumatizing for him right now. What he said in the car about why he didn't want to go came back to him.

"Penny, he'll be fine...we can't force him to go to the hospital if he doesn't want to..."

Behind the determined and adamant set to her expression he saw fear behind it. Worry and fear. He knew she wanted to bury that worry and fear by doing things, dragging him to the hospital and calling the police, making out reports and having split lips stitched up, having pain medications administered. He understood doing things to alleviate other states of mind, but he knew that it wouldn't help in the end.

"Penny, maybe he'll go later, tomorrow...right now we should maybe just, uh, leave him alone..." She was already shaking her head in disagreement and he pressed his lips together as she marched down the hall to Sheldon's room. Maybe she was right, maybe her way was right. He didn't know. He didn't know anything anymore.


	3. Chapter 3

Leonard hung back at the end of the hall, watching Penny's back as she headed down the hall to Sheldon's room. He saw her blond hair pulled up in a ponytail cascading down her back almost like a waterfall, contained in strict rock walls. He crept down the hall behind her because he didn't think she was right, he thought Sheldon should be left alone.

She knocked on the closed door, once, quickly, with authority, and in that knock he heard her thought process that said he had no choice.

"Sheldon," She said, and he saw her pale hand reach out for the doorknob. Leonard leaned against the wall, watching, waiting.

There was no answer. He knew there wouldn't be. It didn't deter her. She opened the door and headed in, and Leonard crept to the doorway and looked inside. Sheldon was laying on his bed, his back to them. He hadn't changed his clothes or even taken off his shoes. He had just come in here and laid on the bed.

"Sheldon, hey," Penny said, her assurance seeming to waver.

She went over to the bed and stood over him. Leonard watched. She reached out and shook him gently, and he tensed up but didn't move, didn't respond.

"We're going to the hospital," Penny said, and he shook his head no and sat up, pulling away from her. Leonard saw that both eyes were now bruised, his lip had stopped bleeding but had puffed up to twice its size.

"We're going! Look at you! You need x-rays and...stitches and pain killers...you can't just stay here...and we should call the cops..."

"I don't want to," he said, his voice weak, and he didn't look at her, he just gazed at the floor.

"I know, honey," she said, sitting next to him and putting her arms around him. He tensed up and winced in pain but she held on, and soon enough he almost relaxed against her, his head down, and Leonard heard the short bursts of sobbing.

He came with them easily enough, Penny holding onto his wrist and pulling him along. Leonard grabbed his jacket and one for Sheldon on the way out. Pasadena nights could be chilly this time of year.

They got into Penny's car, the "check engine" light blinking merrily away. Leonard sat in the back seat, dug around under the seats for the seat belt. He saw Penny smile a tragic smile at Sheldon, and he saw Sheldon ignore her and turn away, his gaze fixed outside the window. Leonard sighed, and felt the jerk of the engine as Penny pulled away from the curb.

The hospital loomed in the distance, the lights marking emergency entrances and the flashing lights of ambulances all causing a visual cacophony that went perfectly with the nature of this evening's events. Leonard leaned his head back against the hard seat, feeling the very beginnings of a pulsing headache behind his eyes.

Penny pulled into a spot that was clearly marked for doctors, and he wondered if she didn't see that sign or if she just didn't care. She stopped the car and got out, and Leonard climbed from the backseat out into the night. Sheldon didn't move from where he was and he wondered if they'd be able to get him from the car to the emergency room. Penny went around to his side of the car and opened the door. He turned his head away from her.

"C'mon, Sheldon, let's go," she said, reaching in and unbuckling his seatbelt, tugging on his wrists to get him out of the car. He got out and stood up in response to her gentle tugging, and she clasped a hand onto his wrist again as she walked toward the entrance. Leonard trailed behind, holding the jackets in his arms.

The ER waiting room was too bright, humming fluorescents illuminating everything, and Leonard squinted against them. In this unforgiving light the bruises on Sheldon's face and his arms looked worse. Penny went up to the desk, waiting in a line to tell their story.

They were given paperwork to fill out and told to wait, and he filled it out best he could. He knew most of the answers to the questions anyway. Penny brought the completed form back up to the desk, and now the waiting started in ernest. Sheldon's legs were bouncing up and down, a jittery show of nervousness he had never seen him display before.

Waiting. He could hear the muffled conversations of the other potential patients, he could hear the occasional electronic beep of a cell phone, a little game being played to pass the time. He could hear the medical jargon talk of the passing nurses and doctors.

He could hear Sheldon's shallow breathing and the occasional sharply inhaled breath, the wince of pain.

Waiting. But Penny had been right, they needed to be here, he needed to be here. Who knew what else was injured, what else was hurt?


	4. Chapter 4

Penny got through the story of finding Sheldon beaten up in his office and they were sent to the rows of chairs and benches to wait. Penny handed him the forms to fill out, and he knew most of the answers pertaining to Sheldon. She was watching him do it, ready to spring up and hand the form back to the woman behind the desk. Sheldon himself sat perfectly still, staring into the middle distance, disconnected.

Leonard looked around the waiting room, at the old people resigned to another chronic bout of pain, at little kids with red noses and croupy coughs, at young men wincing with some sports injury, dirt and grass stains on their knees.

He slid down in his seat, his legs crossed at the ankles. Penny wiggled in her chair, crossing her legs one way and then the other, her flip flop bouncing against the bottom of her foot. Sheldon sat straight, like he usually did, the dark purple bruising on his face looking worse in this unforgiving light.

Sheldon was sitting in between them, and Penny leaned behind him and tugged on Leonard's jacket.

"Hey," she said, her voice just above a whisper.

"What?" he said.

"Come over here with me for some, uh, water," There was a bubbler with little paper cups stacked near it, and she went over there, keeping her eyes on Sheldon like he was a small child and she didn't want a stranger interfering with him.

He stood up, feeling his back creak, and walked over to her. He also kept his eyes on Sheldon.

"You have to go in with him," she said. He licked his lips and looked at Sheldon staring straight ahead, his gaze blank. He was shut down.

"I don't know...he's an adult...there's no reason they would let me,"

"Yeah, but you know he's...you know how he is...he might not even talk to them and we won't know anything, either. You have to go in with him, and make up something as to why they have to let you...you're smart enough," She looked at him with pleading eyes, and he ducked his head and agreed. One of them would have to go with him, he might not cooperate otherwise.

He looked down at the forms in his hand and formulated his plan of attack. He headed back up to the desk and Penny went back to sitting next to Sheldon. He glanced at them, feeling a rush of emotion for both of them, and he swallowed it down and turned to the woman at the desk.

"Hi," he said, and she looked at him with professional curiosity, and the thinly veiled mask of being too busy for whatever he was about to say.

"Listen, my friend there who was beaten up...I should really go in with him because, because he's autistic and the only way he can cooperate with strangers and exams and all that is if I'm with him," Leonard thought about how what he said wasn't exactly a lie, considering Sheldon's track record at the dentist.

"Fine. You can go with him," she said, making a little notation on his forms. That was easy. Leonard breathed out, unaware that he had been holding his breath. He went back to his seat next to Sheldon to wait.

* * *

"Sheldon Cooper," The nurse who opened the door called his name, and Sheldon didn't even flinch. Penny looked at Leonard with a funny, desperate intensity.

"Sheldon, c'mon," he said, standing up, pulling on Sheldon's arm. He wasn't talking, he wasn't looking at anyone. Leonard tugged on his arm the whole way across the waiting room. They were shown to an exam room, and he directed Sheldon to sit on the exam table covered with a white sheet of paper. He heard the crinkle as he sat down, the rustle every time he moved.

From his many asthma attacks that precipitated an emergency room visit as a child, Leonard knew the drill. Nurse first who would take vital signs and ask some questions, then the wait until a doctor arrived. The wait for him was usually filled with a light headedness brought on by his constricting airways. He could see that Sheldon was choosing to disengage, his gaze not focused on anybody, and he hadn't spoken since he told Penny he didn't want to go to the hospital hours earlier.

The nurse attempted to talk to Sheldon, asking him about allergies and what happened, but he turned his head away, and she looked to him.

"He doesn't have any drug allergies," Leonard said, watching as she wrapped the blue blood pressure cuff around his arm, watching as it squeezed tight. He watched as she took his temperature with a tympanic thermometer, the few seconds it took for it to beep. She was glancing at these numbers and typing them into the computer.

"What happened to him?" she said, still typing away at her computer screen.

"I don't know. I found him like that in his office...maybe somebody broke in..."

She nodded, ready to move onto her next case. His vital signs were stable enough, although Leonard thought the blood pressure was a little off, a little high, but that could be due to stress. Getting nearly killed in your office could cause some stress, he figured.

"The doctor will be in soon," she said, and handed him a hospital johnny for Sheldon to change into. He held onto it as she left, and he felt how worn and soft the material was, and he wondered how many people had worn it before this.


	5. Chapter 5

The nurse left the room, closing the door with a soft click. Leonard looked at Sheldon, who was still sitting on the paper covered table and looking off to the side. He saw the bathroom on the other side of the room and he felt the softness of the hospital gown in his hand.

"Sheldon, here, go and put this on," he said, and Sheldon didn't even turn toward him. He was being ignored.

"Sheldon," This time he turned at the sound of his name, his face expressionless.

"C'mon, go put this on," he held the gown out to him, and Sheldon took it and went to the bathroom, shutting the door firmly behind him. Leonard looked around the room, at the little desk with the computer on it, and he could still see the screen with all of Sheldon's information. He saw the blood pressure cuff resting in the basket that was attached to the wall, the tongue depressors in a glass jar on the other counter, swabs in sterile paper containers.

Sheldon came out of the bathroom, looking somehow vulnerable in the hospital gown, and now he could see the beginnings of the bruising on his upper arms, near his neck. He had all of his clothes folded neatly and held them close. He just stood in the doorway to the bathroom, his hair still in disarray, his blackened eye now nearly swollen shut.

"Come back here," Leonard said, patting the place on the table where he had been sitting. Sheldon nodded at him and came back, hoisted himself up on the table.

"I want you to talk to this doctor, answer their questions, okay?" Leonard said, peering up at him from his seat next to that table. No response.

"Okay?"

A beat of silence, and Leonard looked away from all the bruises, the puffed lip, the swollen eye. It occurred to him that whoever had done this could have killed him, and he swallowed hard and felt a recurrence of the headache that had started when he walked into Sheldon's destroyed office.

"Okay," Sheldon said, his voice quiet and totally devoid of its usual confidence.

Now there was nothing to do but wait.

* * *

The doctor came in, a male, someone maybe in their mid to late 40's, gray hair around the temples, round glasses perched on a roman nose. He glanced at Sheldon but didn't seem surprised by all the visible injuries. It was all in the day of the life of an ER doctor, Leonard supposed.

"Sheldon Cooper?" he said, looking at some papers in his hand. Sheldon nodded.

"I'm Dr. Levy" he said, and then he looked questioningly at Leonard.

"I'm Leonard Hofstadter, his roommate, um, I'm here because...see...Sheldon is, doesn't do so well with exams and things of that nature..." The doctor nodded and dismissed him as he turned his attention to Sheldon.

"Sheldon, what happened?" he said, and Sheldon looked down while Leonard willed him to talk.

"It was...I..." that was all he got out before he shook his head, and the doctor looked to Leonard to fill in the rest. Leonard told him what he had seen, what he walked in on, the aftermath of something.

"What's the date?" he asked Sheldon, and he answered correctly.

"Where are you?" he asked, and Sheldon told him.

"Who's the president?" Sheldon told him. Leonard knew the purpose of these questions. There was the potential from this beating that Sheldon had suffered some sort of brain injury.

"Are you dizzy?" he asked, and Sheldon shook his head no.

"Nauseas?" Again he shook his head no.

"Seeing double?" No response.

"Sheldon?"

Sheldon cleared his throat, glanced at Leonard for a second.

"Not double, but it's a little blurry,"

The doctor took out a little penlight and when he turned it on the end of it seemed to glow blue, and shined it in front of Sheldon's eyes. Next he had Sheldon do all sorts of range of motion exercises, grasps and reflexes.

"Lay down," he told him, and Leonard was looking away but heard the crinkle of the paper sheet underneath him as he moved. He watched as he palpated Sheldon's stomach, and he knew what he was doing, feeling for some evidence of internal organ injury. Sheldon's eyes were closed, and then he winced, his eyes squeezing shut.

Who knew what had happened? Had they kicked him, beat him with something? Who knew just how injured he was? Leonard bit his lip and felt the rhythmic pulse of the headache behind his eyes.

The nurse had come back, and the doctor rattled off orders to her.

"Get me a heat CT, abdominal CT, blood panel, UA, and percocet 5/325 2 tabs po prn for pain q 4 hours, but not to be given before the tests, and see if there's a bed, 24 hour observation,"

She nodded and started typing it all into the computer. Then he turned his attention back to Sheldon, who was still laying down, his eyes shut.

"Sheldon, I'm going to admit you for the night...we'll see what the tests show...alright?"

No response except he turned his head toward the wall, his arms wrapped around his stomach.

"That's fine, Dr. Levy, thank you," Leonard said.

The doctor left the room in a swirl of his white coat, off to other cases. Leonard watched Sheldon not moving. The nurse came over to him, holding a specimen cup, the white label on it blank, awaiting all of his particular information.

She observed him, still, cut off from them, and decided her better bet was Leonard, and she turned to him.

"Here, he needs to pee in this, and if he can't we'll have to catheterize him to get the sample...that means we'll have to stick a tube into his bladder-"

"I know what it is," Leonard said, wincing at the thought and thinking how most medical people just assumed no one knew any of these things.

She left, and Leonard gazed at Sheldon, thinking that Penny was right and he needed to be here to make sure he was okay, but how unpleasant it was, how invasive.

"Sheldon, hey...sit up," he said, very gently touching his shoulder, afraid to hurt him further. He did sit up and opened his eyes slowly, glancing at the specimen cup in Leonard's hand.

"Did you hear that nurse? You need to pee in this or-"

"I heard," he said, "and she should know there's more risk of infection with a straight cath," Leonard was relieved to hear him talk so much, and with some of his usual condescending attitude.

Sheldon stood up and took the cup from him and went into the bathroom. Leonard wondered when he could get away and update Penny.


	6. Chapter 6

He'd snuck away, leaving Sheldon with the nurse. There would be a room when one was available, and who knew how long that would be? He wandered out into the waiting room and saw Penny sitting by the vending machine, her blond hair spilling over her shoulders. She was scrolling through her phone.

"Leonard," she said, looking up, seeing him standing there. He blinked, watching as she tucked her phone into her pocket and walked over to him, tugging on his jacket.

"What happened? Is he okay?"

"Yeah, I guess. They're admitting him for overnight observation, so…we're just waiting,"

He told her about the tests they were doing, he told her the tests hadn't been done yet so there were no results. He sat in one of the rows of chairs with the fake orange upholstery and Penny sat next to him, the sharp anxiety turning to tiredness, and she yawned. Her yawn made him yawn. This wasn't his plan for this day. A long day at work in front of the smoldering laser was supposed to yield to a relaxing dinner with his friends, a video game or two, some T.V. and bed. Instead he had rushed to the ER after finding Sheldon beaten and glazed in his office.

"Who did it?" Penny asked him, knowing he didn't know the answer. That was the worst thing, not knowing who or why. All they knew was the result, Sheldon was hurt.

"You know I don't know, and Sheldon won't say, maybe he doesn't know,"

She nodded, her eyes looking sad. He thought it was strange, in a way, how sometimes Sheldon was more like a child in Penny's eyes. He was a genius, a world renowned physicist, he was a likely contender for the Nobel Prize someday, and Penny saw him as a child who needed protection.

The nurse was scanning the waiting room, a stethoscope draped around her neck like a little snake, and then she saw him. She headed over, her hair pulled into a neat ponytail with only a few strands able to escape.

"Leonard," she said, and he knew all he needed to by her expression. Sheldon was being difficult. He shouldn't have left him. He thought about how he was at the dentist.

"Yeah?" he said, and Penny looked at her with round eyes.

"Um, we could use your assistance with your friend," she said, and he nodded. Penny squeezed his arm before he got up.

"I'll be right here," she said, digging her phone out of her pocket.

In the exam room Sheldon was standing up, backed into a corner. They wanted to draw blood for the lab tests, and the next thing would be the X-rays and various CT scans they had ordered. He shouldn't have left at all, he knew how medical procedures and exams tended to go over with him.

"Sheldon, hey," he said, his voice soothing, and Sheldon turned toward the familiar voice. It took a minute for him to focus on him and seem to recognize him, but when he did relief flooded his face.

"Leonard," he said, his back against the wall, the hospital bracelet loose around his wrist.

"Yeah, buddy, hey, come here," he said, getting close to Sheldon but not touching him. He couldn't help but see and be horrified at the bruises, the cut lip, the swelling eye, "come over here," he patted the exam table, the paper sheet rustling under his hand. Sheldon shook his head, his eyes slid to the side, shutting down.

"Sheldon, sit here," he said in a more forceful voice, the tone he used to pull him out of some spiral and make him conform to social convention. Sheldon looked up at that tone of voice and did as Leonard said.

"They need to draw some blood for the tests, and you need to let them, do you understand?" he said, trying to catch his eye but Sheldon wouldn't look at him. His gaze was fixed firmly to the side.

"It's okay," Leonard said, his tone of voice becoming slightly more soothing, and he took his arm and turned it to expose the delicate blue veins beneath his pale skin. He could feel how tense Sheldon was, how every muscle had become rigid again. At the dentist if he wasn't knocked out he would bite.

He nodded at the nurse, and she looked wary but game.

"Okay," she said, and she wrapped the tourniquet around his forearm and tapped at the veins like some craven junkie, and Leonard noticed that Sheldon's eyes were squeezed shut. He knew it wasn't just the prospect of a needle that was upsetting him but the way he was sitting right next to him and holding his arm at the wrist so he wouldn't suddenly jerk it away.

The needle sunk into a vein and he saw the dark red blood flow up into the tube, and Sheldon kept his eyes squeezed shut as she undid the tourniquet in one quick motion. She pressed a square of gauze to the puncture wound and taped it in place and left with her little prize of blood. When Sheldon heard the door click closed behind her he slowly opened his eyes and looked at Leonard.

He let go of Sheldon's arm and he wrapped his arms around himself and laid down on the table, curling up into himself. Leonard wondered if he should be sedated for the rest of the tests and thought he would suggest it. He wished the tests were over and the night of observation was over and that Sheldon could be home in his own room, shutting out the world.


End file.
